The Amazing Lucky Donald Trump

“I actually got lucky because I had a very high draft number. I’ll never forget, that was an amazing period of time in my life” … Donald Trump — whose parents sent him to the New York Military Academy which he completed in June 1964.
Mr. Trump went on to recall, “I was going to the Wharton School of Finance, and I was watching as they did the draft numbers and I got a very, very high number and those numbers never got up to.”
The word “deferment” was not mentioned.

Hmmm … the first lottery of draft numbers was held on December 1, 1969 … yet Mr. Trump graduated from Wharton in June of 1968. Thus there have been questions, what was Mr. Trump’s views on military service ?

Selective Service records reveal that Trump, the fortunate son of a multimillionaire real estate baron, took repeated steps to avoid serving in Vietnam.

By the time his number (356) was drawn, Trump had already received four student deferments and a medical deferment, according to military records on file with the National Archives and Records Administration.

Trump obtained his first two Class 2-S student deferments in June 1964 and December 1965, when he was student at Fordham University in the Bronx. He was briefly reclassified as 1-A–or “available for military service”–in late-November 1966, but that classification was switched back to 2-S three weeks later.

Another 2-S deferment is dated January 16, 1968, just months before his graduation from UPenn (to which he transferred following his sophomore year at Fordham).

Following his UPenn graduation, Trump–no longer qualified for a 2-S deferment–was again briefly classified as available for service on July 9. However, three months later, on October 15, his classification was switched to 1-Y, which was given to men deemed qualified for military service “only in time of national emergency.”

The 1-Y classification came a month after Trump underwent an “Armed Forces Physical Examination,” according to Selective Service records, which note the results of the exam as “DISQ.” While the military records do not further detail why Trump was granted the 1-Y deferment, a 1992 biography of the businessman by journalist Wayne Barrett reported that Trump received a medical deferment following the September 17, 1968 exam.

Trump’s 1-Y classification stayed in effect until February 1, 1972 when it was changed to a 4-F classification (which covered registrants not qualified for military service). The change in classification was likely prompted by the military’s December 1971 decision to abolish the 1-Y classification.

Hmmm … Lucky … or did someone intervene in Mr. Trump’s behalf … anyone ever hear of any deferments for “real estate executives” … to use one or Mr. Trump’s favorite words “Amazing“.

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